The 3DS has received something of a bad press in the eight months since its release. People have complained about the cost (which was subsequently brought down), they've complained about the "lack of software," the 3D, the lack of a second analogue stick, the method in which they've added an analogue stick – it seems nothing Nintendo can do is good enough.
Which is exactly why you shouldn't believe anything you read on the internet, it has just been revealed that the 3DS has outsold the DS's original twelve month sales in just eight, clearly proving that Nintendo have very little to worry about. In an interview with Time Techland, Reggie Fils-Aime discusses exactly how their new handheld has done.
"In sales through this past Saturday—8 months—it has outsold the full 12 months of the original DS. During that 12 months time, the original DS sold 2.37 million and we just surpassed that this past Saturday, so we’ve got real good momentum going into the holidays."
But where has that momentum come from? You'd be pretty cynical if you put it all down to the price drop, although I don't think that particularly hurt.
"3DS has been having positive momentum since the digital content came onboard with the eShop, the launch of Ocarina of Time and obviously the price reduction. We’ve been able to fuel that fire with Pokemon: Rumble Blast and Star Fox. What Mario (3D Land) did was bring a whole new range of consumers into the 3DS franchise."